SD Unified Ethnic Studies Expansion Sparks Debate Over How Race Should Be Taught In The Classroom

Speaker 1: 00:00 Earlier this week, the San Diego unified school board unanimously approved a plan that will integrate anti-racism and ethnic studies education into its curriculum. The vote was proceeded by a protest of roughly two dozen people who oppose the effort with some equating the new curriculum to components of the hotly contested critical race theory. This expansion of ethnic studies comes at a time of heightened racial awareness in San Diego, where many are reconsidering, how racism should be confronted in the classroom, especially after several racist incidents at local high schools. Joining me now to discuss the scope of the new curriculum and some of the debate around it is San Diego unified board, president Richard Berrera Richard White. Speaker 2: 00:44 Thanks so much, Jay. Thanks for having me. It's becoming Speaker 1: 00:47 Increasingly common to see people conflate elements of multicultural education initiatives with critical race theory. What will this new ethnic studies and anti-racism training cover? And why do you think some in the community are equating it with critical race theory? Speaker 2: 01:05 Well, you know, the most important thing that we're doing to move forward Jade is, you know, we are absolutely committed as a district that the barriers that people have faced for generations as a result of racism, that we want to equip our young people to be able to move beyond those barriers and not simply pass down the same problems that we inherited as, as, as prior generations. And in order to equip young people to combat racism, we need to have very honest and deep conversations in our courses about our history as a country, our history as communities, why we're at the place that we're at now and motivate our young people to believe that they can actually make change and make things better going forward. And so, you know, ethnic studies for instance, is really about young people learning that their own history is incredibly relevant and has produced so many positive contributions to our country that often have gone overlooked, but also that the situations that young people understand that they're living in day to day are the product, you know, a long history, uh, that, you know, includes, you know, racism and racist practices all over our country and here in San Diego as well. Speaker 2: 02:38 So what we know Jade is that when we are able to speak honestly and directly and clearly with young people about our history, good and bad young people get very engaged and very motivated and want to learn more and want to be on the front lines of making our community going forward. And what are you Speaker 1: 03:01 Hearing from educators within San Diego unified about the need for ethnic studies? Speaker 2: 03:06 Educators are strongly in favor of ethnic studies. And I, you know, when we hold professional development for teachers around ethnic studies, we get great response. You know, teachers want to, uh, uh, learn a new ways of teaching new ways of engaging students, new content that they can share with their students. And the ethnic studies training that we've done over the past couple of years has been incredibly well received by our teachers because here's what our teachers know when they're able to teach content that is relevant to students and teach it in a way that engages students. They see better attendance, they see more motivation, uh, of young people to do assignments, better grades, better academic performance, but also a bigger sense on the part of young people that they can actually contribute to the world and be part of change going forward. And that's very motivating, as you can imagine to teachers, how have Speaker 1: 04:08 Parents of children enrolled within San Diego unified reacted to the approval of this curriculum? Expansion Speaker 2: 04:15 Parents have been overwhelmingly supportive, you know, three quarters of the students in our district are students of color. So we have parents, you know, that for decades have been saying, look, we need, uh, what our students learn to be more relevant to their own lives and to our families, uh, histories. Um, but parents of, you know, white students have also been incredibly supportive of ethnic studies because they don't want their students to go forward in a world where, uh, racism affects everybody. You know, I think one of the, uh, you know, stories that certainly we can take out of this incident at Cornado high school is that had the students, you know, at Cornado high school, been better equipped, uh, to understand what was going on. You know, when an adult started to pass out tortillas, you know, to throw at the other players, I think the students would have been in a, in a, in a better position to, you know, to say, that's not who we are. Speaker 2: 05:18 That's not what we do. Unfortunately. Now, you know, students Coronado high school and orange Glen high school are both having to, uh, you know, live in the aftermath of an incident that they wouldn't have wanted to be involved in. So, you know, that's a small example, but on a larger scale, I think, you know, what we're seeing from parents of all of our students is a sense that we don't want to continue to live in a world where racism is such a limiting factor to everybody. We want to equip our students with the ability to move forward and make a better world. What about Speaker 1: 05:53 That incident with the tortillas being thrown? Do you think, do you think that the students involved in that were that innocent and that they just didn't know what they were doing was racist? Speaker 2: 06:03 No, I think, I think they were acting in a, in a, in a way that was racist. And that's the problem, you know, the, the problem is why are we putting young people in a position, whether they're victims of racism or perpetrators of racism to be either, you know, why aren't we equipping people to move beyond that and, and move past, you know, the, uh, you know, the way of thinking and the way of acting, that's been a burden on adults for generations and generations. So yeah, of course it was a racist act, but why aren't we educating our young people, not to perpetrate racist acts and why aren't we educating our young people, uh, to confront racist facts when, when they happen, you know, a constant Speaker 1: 06:52 Refrain against this kind of teaching is that, uh, children are too young to confront the horrors of racism or they're doing so with some, so some sort of racial division. Um, what can you tell us about that? Speaker 2: 07:03 Young people understand that we already have racial division and that we already experienced horrors and incredibly negative, uh, you know, uh, situations as a result of racism, young people live that every day, what they wanted, what they want to know is why are we in this situation? Why is the world the way that it is and how can we make the world better? So, you know, young people, they're not coming at this in a way that, um, that they're not already experiencing problems associated with racism. Uh, they want to not be trapped, uh, in a situation where they are going to move forward in a world that hasn't addressed these problems and pass these problems on to future generations. I've been Speaker 1: 07:48 Speaking with San Diego unified board, president Richard Barrera, Richard, thank you so much for joining us. Thank you, Jade.